lightcastle (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
lightcastle) wrote2010-12-07 10:15 am
lightcastle) wrote2010-12-07 10:15 am
Assange has been arrested
I thought it would take a lot longer for an actual arrest, which is why I hadn't gotten around to posting about the rape/sexual assault charges. Like many people, I think the charges are being politicized - we should be so lucky that Interpol treats rape charges this seriously and with such priority as the normal course of events (Top of the most-wanted list? Really?). That said, I am a both/and kind of guy - the charges are being politicized, but that doesn't meant the charges shouldn't be taken seriously or trivialized.
It's been pretty depressing to watch the Assange supporters jump right into rape-trivializing in various ways though. I've seen the "Assange is our modern Jesus" thing in a local paper. (He is being persecuted by the Empire and his followers will continue his message.) There has been a lot of the "OMG, she's a radical feminist - CLEARLY it was a set up!" I've been told Sweden has a law making it a 2-year prison sentence for sex without a condom, as well as a law called "sex by surprise". (That term was used by Assange's lawyer. I'd like to think it was a translation error, since apparently the term is used in Sweden as slang for rape, just as it is here.) I've seen horror expressed that a man can be arrested on a woman's say so in Sweden. (One article saying it was worse than Iraq under Saddam Hussein. Um, buddy, the cops can arrest you on one person's say so in just about any country in the world. Convicting you is another story, but they sure as hell can arrest you.) There have been the "Assange is a great man, so even if he did do it, he shouldn't turn himself in" statements, which are a little too Polanski-esque for comfort.
Is he guilty? I don't know. The kind of power-tripping assault he's accused of certainly matches what I've seen of his public character and my personal experience with technophile radicals, especially tech/hacker ones, who tend to be pretty contemptuous of women. So I find them very plausible, but that's not a legal judgment. At the same time, I have a healthy distrust of cops and the legal system.
While losing their charismatic front man would hurt Wikileaks' place as the primary outlet for such material, I suspect they will continue without him and I fully expect other groups to adopt the model Wikileaks has been so effective with, or take other approaches to combating government secrecy.
It's been pretty depressing to watch the Assange supporters jump right into rape-trivializing in various ways though. I've seen the "Assange is our modern Jesus" thing in a local paper. (He is being persecuted by the Empire and his followers will continue his message.) There has been a lot of the "OMG, she's a radical feminist - CLEARLY it was a set up!" I've been told Sweden has a law making it a 2-year prison sentence for sex without a condom, as well as a law called "sex by surprise". (That term was used by Assange's lawyer. I'd like to think it was a translation error, since apparently the term is used in Sweden as slang for rape, just as it is here.) I've seen horror expressed that a man can be arrested on a woman's say so in Sweden. (One article saying it was worse than Iraq under Saddam Hussein. Um, buddy, the cops can arrest you on one person's say so in just about any country in the world. Convicting you is another story, but they sure as hell can arrest you.) There have been the "Assange is a great man, so even if he did do it, he shouldn't turn himself in" statements, which are a little too Polanski-esque for comfort.
Is he guilty? I don't know. The kind of power-tripping assault he's accused of certainly matches what I've seen of his public character and my personal experience with technophile radicals, especially tech/hacker ones, who tend to be pretty contemptuous of women. So I find them very plausible, but that's not a legal judgment. At the same time, I have a healthy distrust of cops and the legal system.
While losing their charismatic front man would hurt Wikileaks' place as the primary outlet for such material, I suspect they will continue without him and I fully expect other groups to adopt the model Wikileaks has been so effective with, or take other approaches to combating government secrecy.